REDUCING OUR DEBT TO NATURE
We in India have been persistently ignoring the signs and symptoms of environmental degradation which have now reached crisis proportions. World Environment Day is one particular occasion in the year when we can reflect on all these issues and resolve to take the next steps with a sense of purpose and determination, feels Dr RK Pachauri, chairman, IPCC and director-general, TERI
The world is nearing the end of the first decade of this millennium, and perhaps never in the past has human civilisation had so many reasons to feel concerned about the state of this planet’s ecosystems and natural resources. India, in particular, has flourished as a civilisation based on the solid principle of sustainable use of natural resources and the services that they provide for the sustenance and survival of all species. A reverence for everything connected with nature has been an intimate part of India’s development and growth strategy for thousands of years, and it is only after we embarked on a path of industrialisation that a clash between well-established traditions and values, and the desire to produce and consume more and more have come into conflict. There is no basic reason behind such a conflict because economic development can co-exist with the sustainable use of natural resources. In modern times it was Gandhiji who saw the wisdom and essentiality of using the earth’s resources on a sustainable basis, but despite his repeated pleas to the leaders of India prior to Independence, we have essentially adopted the western model of development without any attempt to adapt all that is good in western society for our own benefit while preserving our cultural ethos. As a result, India has deviated from the age-old tradition and practice of revering nature and the harmful effects of such an approach are seen increasingly.
Al Gore in his book Earth in the Balance has asked the question “what does it mean to make the effort to save the global environment the central organising principle of our civilisation?” He answers this question by stating that for one thing it means securing widespread agreement that it should be the organising principle, and that the way such a consensus formed is especially important because this is when priorities are established and goals are set. He also contends that such a consensus has usually been secured only with the emergence of a life or death threat to the existence of society itself. If this be the case, then the question would be relevant whether human society is actually facing such a life or death threat today.
We in India have been persistently ignoring the signs and symptoms of environmental degradation which have now reached crisis proportions. Our river systems have been polluted to a point that they are hardly better than sewers that carry human waste. The problem of air pollution is causing widespread morbidity and mortality all across the country. We not only ignore it, but are actually adding to the problem through misplaced policies and actions. Indian society not only has a growing problem of outdoor air pollution, but we also have hundreds of millions of people exposed to unacceptable levels of indoor air pollution. The dependence on biomass for cooking, often of very poor quality and content, has actually increased in absolute terms even though its share as a percentage has gone down slightly. Similarly, deforestation and loss of biodiversity represent an almost irreversible form of degradation, which is proving to be very difficult to arrest or reverse. In 1997, on the eve of India celebrating 50 years of Independence, TERI brought out the major findings of an extensive study to evaluate the country’s record of management of natural resources and the environment over the period 1947 to 1997 and where we would go on a path of business as usual. The findings of this major effort were quite frightening as we assessed the damage to our environment. It also showed the huge economic loss that the country was incurring on account of a predominant emphasis on only “end of pipe” solutions. As a result, it was estimated that the country was losing over 10 percent of its GDP on account of environmental damage and degradation. A system which is driven largely by immediate and short-term gains has by and large neglected the need to conserve the wealth of natural resources. While fiscal policies have focused often on providing sops to industries like the manufacture of cars and to keeping the national debt within manageable limits, the natural debt that society owes to nature has been systematically ignored. The result is the progressive and alarming decline in the health of India’s natural resources, which will prove particularly harmful to the long term interests of this generation and more so of generations yet to come.
We appear to have forgotten the lessons of several civilisations, which ignored the central organizing principle that Al Gore has referred to, and who, therefore, have had to suffer large scale distress and in some cases a complete collapse of civilisation as it existed. There are numerous examples of the decline of civilisations that have used and overused the natural resources on which their existence depended, but perhaps the most prominent are the ones that flourished as the Easter Island, Sumer, the Mayan and Roman civilisations. Easter Island and Sumer are known to have failed due to depletion of their natural resources. Essentially, both these civilisations found that their ecosystems were unable to regenerate, and failure began in their heartlands where demand was highest. Those parts of their population which survived were essentially elements that were not part of the heartland of unsustainable demand. Two reasons why despite these major setbacks civilisations have been able to survive is because of natural regeneration as well as human migration which reduced the demand on overstressed ecosystems services. However, several problems that we have created today have left our ecosystems in a condition that is far beyond the tipping point and, therefore, totally beyond the ability to regenerate.
In broad and simple terms we can look at WWF’s living planet index which essentially computes on a composite basis the sum total of human activities in relation to the earth’s ecosystems being able to absorb their impacts. One dominant example of this is the problem of climate change where human beings, through cumulative emissions of greenhouse gases, have led to impacts that are now threatening the stability of human societies in several parts of the planet. For instance, if we look at the problem of sea level rise resulting from climate change, there is the possibility of several low lying areas in the world suffering major damage including the small island states and coastal areas such as Bangladesh, parts of Thailand and even parts of the US. In these locations, the problem of sea level rise would cause serious impacts even before the threat of complete submergence materialises. Every time there is a storm surge or cyclonic activity there is large scale destruction and damage. As the level of the sea rises in the future, many people living in these areas will have no choice but to migrate to higher elevations which may be very far from their own homes. It is entirely possible that millions of people could become climate refugees and move to locations that are at higher elevations. While a number of these vulnerable communities would have to take measures for adapting to the impacts of climate change, globally it is essential that we mitigate the emissions of greenhouse gases and thus avoid some of the worst impacts of climate change that would take place in coming years and decades.
Mitigation would require a major shift in the way we produce and consume energy. A shift away from overwhelming dependence on fossil fuels is now long overdue, but unfortunately, technological development has been slow and inadequate largely because government policies have not promoted investments in research and development, myopically as a result of relatively low prices of oil since 1985 up to 2006 or so. It is now, therefore, imperative for a country like India treating the opportunity of harnessing renewable energy on a large scale as a national imperative. This country is extremely well endowed with solar, wind and biomass sources of energy. Where we have lagged, unfortunately, is in our ability to develop and to create technological solutions for harnessing these resources.
One particular trajectory for carrying out stringent mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions assessed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) clearly shows the need for ensuring that global emissions of greenhouse gases peak no later than 2015 and reduce rapidly thereafter. The cost associated with such a trajectory is truly modest and would amount, in the estimation of the IPCC, to not more than 3 percent of the global GDP in 2030. In other words, the level of prosperity that the world would have reached without mitigation would at worst be postponed by a few months or a year at the most. This is clearly not a very high price to pay for protecting hundreds of millions of people from the worst risks associated with climate change. Any such effort, however, would require lifestyles to change appropriately also. Mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions is not a mere technological fix, and clearly requires changes in lifestyles, transformation of a country’s economic structure, whereby effective reduction in emissions is brought about such as through the consumption of much lower quantities of animal protein. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has determined that the emissions from the livestock sector amount to 18 percent of the total. The reduction of emissions from this source is entirely in the hands of human beings, who have never questioned the impacts that their dietary habits of consuming more and more animal protein are bringing about. Mitigation overall has huge co-benefits, such as lower air pollution and health benefits, higher energy security and greater employment.
World Environment Day is one particular occasion in the year when we can reflect on all these issues and resolve to take the next steps with a sense of purpose and determination. However, a change in the right direction would require efforts everyday of the year and the ability to bring about a rapid transformation towards a sustainable future for humanity. It would be tragic to contemplate no change in today’s human actions, which are based on technological sophistication and progress far beyond our most optimistic projections even a few years ago. Technology can be directed in a manner that creates sustainable solutions. If despite the knowledge and capacity we possess, our civilisation collapses because of violation of the central organizing principle of saving the environment, we would qualify as the most selfish generation in history.